Val's story of how she came to Her War, Her Voice, and why she stayed to work with us is the first in the series of our stories we'll be running the next few weeks.I'd say something wonderful and nice about this, as I do with all our blogs, but I think Val's words are better than anything I could come up with.I will ask though-Why do you stay with us?~Kristina

Finding Her War Her Voice felt like coming home to me. I was coming out of a time where I was finding my feet after a season of trauma and loss. One of the compounding traumas was a loss of community.I attended the second HWHV/CB retreat and I can remember feeling very strongly, “I am home. These people are my people.” I believed for the first time in a long time that I wasn’t alone. Those words went deep… It wasn’t about proximity—these women were from all over the country. It was about knowing that there would be someone who “got it” or who would be willing to sit and listen until they did get it from that point on.When I was asked to be on the team, I wanted to be part of someone else having that realization. I think I asked for time to think about it, but I knew what the answer was as soon as my breath caught at the question.Ultimately, that is what brought be to Her War.

Why I stay is a different ballgame.The first answer I would give is very simply this: our team. I don’t even know how to write about the amazing women who make up this team or the journey that we’ve been on together. That feeling of coming home happened again. Our training was intense and it was thorough. It made me a better person. And it brought me closer to the people who were training and working with me. We knew that people could relate deeply, could consider the weight of words. We knew Her War Her Voice was a movement and we wanted to spread it.For a while we were idealists drunk with the possibility of utopia.Life has happened to all of us since those first heady days. I mean some serious life. Tragedy and crisis that has been astonishingly constant. As for the team there were bumps along the way. No Utopia maintains perfection and happiness forever.But this team was given to one another. We didn’t take that lightly, and we still don’tSo we found a way through. We kept listening. We kept talking. We gave space. Things got a little messy sometimes, but really?We are still each other’s people.And we still want to give that to others.That doesn’t happen every day. I cannot and will not take that for granted. And I remain incredibly grateful for each of the people I have the honor to work with.

Even more than that though, there is still work to be done. I know this because I am living it. I know this because I am still making sense of it. I see this in all of our team. In friends. I feel that to say more than that is to say words that have already been said, but if there is work to be done, well….I still want to do it.So I am. Because Her War Her Voice and the community of amazing people who make it up, continue to allow me to.

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Val

"My story bears too much heartache to be ignored and too much beauty to be hidden." ​- Dr. Dan Allender

MY STORY

For a girl who loves stories, I have struggled to make sense of my own or of my own place in it. I met my husband in college and teased him about his cowboy boots and love for Ronald Reagan. I knew from the beginning he wanted to be in the Navy.

I didn’t realize how much of our marriage we would navigate while he was circumnavigating the globe on an aircraft carrier. I didn’t expect the adventures we would have when he was home—or the ones I would eventually become brave enough to take on without him when he was underway. I didn’t expect that we would also face cancer and loss, or that we would dive head first into home schooling our daughters. All of these are part of my story, but as I have grown into it I’ve also come to treasure digging into the story of others. Blogging for Her War Her Voice, interacting on our social media channels, and leading retreats for HWHV and Courage Beyond has given me the immense privilege of doing just that.I do love stories.

I also love being barefoot in green grass, the show West Wing, chocolate and my family.